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Infant feeding

Get advice and support with infant feeding from other users here.

Original poster

Nell McAndrew article on extended breastfeeding

265 replies

treacletart · 05/03/2009 08:54

here

OP posts:
RedOnHerHead · 06/03/2009 23:51

night all

ShowOfHands · 06/03/2009 23:53

Ouch. I had an episiotomy and 3 attempted ventouse pulls. Didn't work, ended up with an emergency caesarean. I still have nightmares/flashbacks. I won't start to try and explain the lack of support in hospital but I will say it's made me passionate about trying to support others. I know that a hard start can lead to a successful ending now.

Bed.... bed.... bed...

Astrophe · 07/03/2009 00:01

pigletmania - just wanted to say I think you've done well for keeping your cool in a bit of a 'heated' discussion...many lesser MNers have fallen here before

Also wanted to add my experience of 'extended' bf:

I BF my first child until she was 12/13 months. Mostly I stopped because I was tryinbg for another baby, but actually I had never even considered feeding beyond 12 months. Nobody I knew did...and I just didn't think about it at all. I'd heard people say "Once they can ask for it, they're too old" and I thought "hmmm, yes, maybe.."

With my second child, I struggled with feeding but managed to get past 6 months, and then planned to continue to 12 months or so...BUT, this time I knew people who were BFing their 15, 18 month olds, with no plans of stopping. I wasn't trying to conceive, and my son was a high need baby and very relient on BFing...and so I continued...and continued...and I finally stopped when he was almnost 2, bascily because I was getting fed up with it!

It did not 'feel' weird at all to be feeding him at almost 2. I guess because he had grown slowly over the years - it wasn't as though somebody had handed me a toddler and said "feed this!"

Looking back, I would never have imagined I feed so long. It was a combination of seeing other Mums feeding longer, hearing about extended feeding mums of MN, reading about all the very significant health benefits to baby and Mum, and a different baby, who showed me very clearly that he needed feeding for longer than 12 months!

For me, it was deifinately something I should not have knocked until I tried it!

I am 20 weeks with my third child now...who knows what I will do? TBH I do feel a bit 'funny' about the thought of feeding beyond 2.5 /3 years...BUT, I know now that I may feel very differentlyu about it in time to come, and any hangups I have are my problem, and a cultural problem, not a problem with breastfeeding.

I hope that story encourages others who are not sure about 'extended; BFing

chipmonkey · 07/03/2009 00:06

I bfed ds3 for so long mainly because of MN. It was nice to know that I didn't have to stop and that it was entirely up to me and ds3. In the end I stopped as it was working very effectively as a contraceptive and I was ttc but I hated stopping as ds3 would have been happy to carry on. I did feel guilty.

ABetaDad · 07/03/2009 08:23

Why is breast feeding a contraceptive?

Do you mean it acts through a biological mechanism to stop your body conceiving or do you mean you were just too tired out to actually want to try and conceive?

Habbibu · 07/03/2009 08:25

Abetadad - breastfeeding suppresses ovulation, thereby reducing the chances of conception.

ShowOfHands · 07/03/2009 08:43

Also, the hormones involved in bfing are not conducive to a fertile cycle. Breastfeeding women who are ovulating often have a short luteal phase (time between ovulation and period) which doesn't leave enough time for a fertilised egg to implant. So you have a cycle, but not one that allows the conception of a child.

ShowOfHands · 07/03/2009 08:45

Not always though. Many, many women get pg while bfing. I'm fertile and breastfeeding but for about 7 months was ovulating but had a short luteal phase. I'm not trying to get pregnant though so is a moot point.

Habbibu · 07/03/2009 08:48

Well, yes - it's not a good idea to rely on the fact that you may not be ovulating or have a normal cycle!

Habbibu · 07/03/2009 08:52

Was just thinking - breastfeeding reduces the risk of breast cancer, so it could be for the mother too, in a v. positive way!

ShowOfHands · 07/03/2009 08:55

Or to look at it the other more accurate way, by not bfing you increase your risk of breast cancer. Bfing being the biological norm.

Ignore me.

Habbibu · 07/03/2009 08:59

Well, I didn't mean that per se - I mean, if you don't have any children then it's not the biological norm for you, is it? Just that the more time you spend breastfeeding, the more months you spend with fewer oestrogens circulating. So ideally we'd all have 6 kids and breastfeed them all for 2 years+!

Babieseverywhere · 07/03/2009 09:02

Abetadad,
Breastfeeding only acts as an effective contraception in certain circumstances. When baby is exclusively demand feed day and night, no dummies/formula/solids etc. Mother must not have started her periods again and a couple of other things I can't remember.

Even so it is not 100% safe and should not be relied on as birth control. Especially as you could fall pregnant with the first egg released, i.e. before your first post pregnancy period.

There are many pregnant nursing mums and tandem nursing mums on mumsnet (including me) who have conceived whilst breastfeeding a baby/toddler. Breastfeeding does not prevent or curtail a sex life anymore than a fully FF baby does.

ShowOfHands · 07/03/2009 09:02

Oh I get you. Just trying to get myself into the habit of not referring to 'advantages' of bfing. But that's only in comparison with ff really. Bfing being the biological norm for feeding offspring.

I rather like your thinking Habbibu. I shall have 6 children forthwith.

theyoungvisiter · 07/03/2009 09:17

When my mum died of breast cancer the (german) doctor actually said to me "you must have many children very young and breastfeed them for a long time"

That may be true but it wasn't the first thing on my mind at the time - I was only 24!

Having said that, it probably did influence me a bit in my decision to let DS1 self-wean.

ShowOfHands · 07/03/2009 09:21

I am sorry about your Mum.

I read that in a harsh German accent. I saw a German GP once and he told me to have 'lots of vigorous sex as pain relief' as I couldn't take anything stronger than paracetamol. Also said 'I need to examine your breasts but will get a lady in to chaperone so I'm not sued for touchy touchy'. He was lovely. Mad. But lovely.

theyoungvisiter · 07/03/2009 09:23

Very glad that everyone kissed and made up on this thread! I was thinking abotu it in bed last night.

I must say, I do find it odd being told that there is a right and wrong time to stop bfing. I have never seen an extended BFer criticise anyone else as being "wrong" to wean their baby at a year, 6 months whatever, yet I have many, many times seen other mothers tell extended bfers they are weird, wrong, out for their own personal gratification or whatever.

I truly don't understand why anyone feels the need to prescribe to others in this way. And I agree with babieseverywhere that until you have BF a toddler you have no idea what it's like. I never intended to feed this long - I meant to bf for a year and then stop. I thought bfing a toddler was weird and wrong too, but now I realise that you might as well say it's weird and wrong to kiss and cuddle your toddler - it is no more sexual/weird/personally gratifying than giving your child a cuddle.

theyoungvisiter · 07/03/2009 09:26

showofhands, I actually did laugh out loud when I read that!! Touchy touchy is brilliant.

This was a lady German doctor working as a GP in the NHS, she was very nice but quite, quite barking. I had gone to her about something completely unrelated and she saw about my mother on the notes and came out with it out of the blue! Maybe the Germans health service has a policy of pushing all their mad doctors off to the UK?

ShowOfHands · 07/03/2009 09:32

Perhaps it's an exchange programme and there are some disgruntled Germans upset that their English doctor offered only a prescription and no bizarre unsolicited advice.

The GP in question was rather perturbed that he wasn't allowed to do more home visits as he enjoyed English hospitality. He whispered conspiratorially, 'some of them offer biscuits'. Other Dr at the surgery is Jamaican and the only time I've seen him, he told me that NHS Direct were as much use as a 'bucket of p*ss'.

It's like Royston Vasey round these parts.

harpsichordcarrier · 07/03/2009 09:32

to answer SoHands question:
I always demand fed, but the pattern with the two children ended up being very different because I was responding to very different needs. after a year or so, dd1 fed morning, naptime and bedtime, and never really asked outside of those times. she was a fantastic sleeper and didn't really wake in the night after abut 3 months old
dd2 was completely different and never ever got into any kind of routine. she would ask to feed at random times, day or night, but I never really fed her to sleep.
I never really "offered" with either of them, just followed their cues although with dd2 I did suggest it a couple of times when she has been very upset and couldn't calm herself (she is bloody terrible quite a poor sleeper and even now).
they both stopped of their own accord somewhere between 3 and 3 and a half.

ShowOfHands · 07/03/2009 09:34

Thanks harpsi, my dd sounds like your dd2.

harpsichordcarrier · 07/03/2009 09:48

I think that people who assume bf = no sex have only experienced the first few weeks of bf, i.e. they associate bf with life with a new born, sleepless nights, sore nipples.
once bf settles down, it isn't exhausting, draining necessarily. it is perfectly perfectly normal. and it certainly has never affected our sex life in a negative life past the first couple of weeks.

pigletmania · 07/03/2009 09:54

Astrophe congratulations on the impending arrival, its not worth getting heated and rude as it does you no favours at all, you just have to accept that everyone has different views, its great that you bf your two for all that time. I did go in a bit gung ho, but i wanted to have a bit of a discussion about it. For me personally, after 2 years i would want to stop but i have never had experience of bf for a long time so dont really know.

I will say in my opionion as i have no medical facts, that milk supply does vary from woman to woman, i never personally felt that engorged or full, my husbands sister and Katies godmother had it all coming out and not know what to do with it all. I think that stress might also be a factor too, if the mother is under stress or depressed that might affect their supply.

Hope you all dont mind my droning on, initially i was demand feeding my daughter every 2 hours in fact so she should have been full up, i understand the supply and demand theory but for me it just wasent happening. BF though for the short time i managed did give me a fantastic figure, i looked like a teenager again lol.

tiktok · 07/03/2009 10:02

piglet, yes it's good there is some calm now

You say you have no medical facts - fine. This should, though, inhibit you from expressing an opinion which depends on having the facts. Otherwise I might say, 'I have no medical facts, but it's my opinion that people with red hair are usually short sighted' - without medical facts on a topic, shouldn't we stay silent, rather than end up looking foolish or worse, misleading people who know even less than we do?

Stress and depression have no affect on supply - this is an important thing to be clear about as too many women worry unnecessarily about it, and some of them even stop bf because they fear their own stress or depression is affecting their baby's nutrition.

Hope no one minds me clearing that one up

RedOnHerHead · 07/03/2009 11:03

tiktok - glad you have no medical evidence on the red hair = short sightedness! I would have to book an appointment with specsavers pronto!